She's a feminist icon, a painting legend, and the subject of an upcoming movie. Now, painter Frida Kahlo is beginning to stir on the Lycos search logs.

Who was Frida Kahlo? A celebrated Mexican painter who died in 1954, Kahlo was most famous for her self-portraits full of symbolism and graphic anatomical references. But she's become a feminist and Leftist heroine due to her open bisexuality, her struggle with abusive husband (and fellow painter) Diego Rivera, and her open espousal of communism (among her close associates was the exiled Leon Trotsky).

Frida Kahlo searches have tripled in the past three weeks, and searches for Diego Rivera have doubled. Lest you think that's only because of the return of school students, Kahlo is getting twice as many searches as a year ago at this time.

The legend of Frida Kahlo will spread this fall due to the upcoming film, Frida, which opens October 25 in Los Angeles and New York and then spreads across the country. A number of actresses have fought to play Kahlo over the last few years -- for a long time, Madonna was the rumored star -- but the film finally settled with Mexican actress (and Internet favorite) Salma Hayek in the lead role.

Other stars include Alfred Molina as Rivera, Antonio Banderas as Rivera's artistic rival David Siqueiros, Geoffrey Rush as Trotsky, and Ed Norton in a cameo as Nelson Rockefeller, who once contracted Rivera to paint a lobby mural at Rockefeller Center only to destroy it when Rivera painted Vladimir Lenin as part of it.

Biopics aren't necessarily big financial successes, but this movie is definitely an attempt at teaching people about Kahlo's life and garnering a few Oscar nominations in the process. What's worth watching is Hayek's makeup as Kahlo -- apparently the usually-beautiful actress has agreed to take on Kahlo's huge connected eyebrows but not the prominent mustache that Kahlo painted into her self-portraits. This was one feminist who didn't believe in plucking or bleaching.

TOMORROW: The new Lycos 50.